High School Sports Blog

Empress Davenport’s points are down but Duncanville has strength in numbers

Through three playoff games, Duncanville’s Empress Davenport still hasn’t hit her scoring average. The Texas signee opened the postseason with two one-point games and has a combined eight points, 5.7 below her average per game, through three rounds.

That’s great news for the Panthers.

They are flourishing while their best player is struggling, beating L.D. Bell, 68-33, Flower Mound Marcus, 50-31, and Southlake Carroll, 60-46. And Davenport, working through a hand injury, can only get better. Duncanville plays Amarillo on Friday at Wilkerson-Grienes Activity Center in Fort Worth.

Tasia Foman, Ariel Atkins and Morgan Bolton have stepped up to fill the scoring void. Foman is averaging 21 points in the postseason, a 7.8-point increase from her season standard. Atkins is scoring at a 14.1 ppg clip, compared to 9.6 for the season. And Bolton has almost doubled her point production with an 8.6 average.

“It’s a team thing,” Atkins said after scoring a game-high 22 points against Carroll on Tuesday. “We get along and we’re always talking. We don’t care who scores.”

That depth enhances the speed advantage Duncanville has over most teams. The Panthers come at opponents in waves and from all angles. Atkins, 5-9, scored most of her points down low, driving to the basket and posting up. It’s a position she’s comfortable playing, despite the inches she gives up to defenders underneath.

“She plays inside when we need her to, but she works in practices all the time on the outside,” coach Cathy Self-Morgan said.

Self-Morgan said Davenport is “just playing tight. She’s got a thing going on with her hand so she has got to work through that, but she still brings so much with her presence on the outside and all the other things she does.”